Two New Members Join City Council

Pittsburgh City Council has two new members. Natalia Rudiak and Robert Daniel Lavelle were sworn in to office today during City Councils first meeting of the year. Rudiak takes the place of former councilman Jim Motznik who has become a district magistrate and Lavelle replaces Tonya Payne who is planning on running for a seat in the State Legislature. Rudiak was named chair of the General and Government Services committee by new Council President Darlene Harris while Lavelle has yet to decide what committee he would like to pursue. Rudiak says she wants to focus on working cooperatively with other council members and bring in development to all districts while Lavelle wants to work on reinvigorating business districts and cleaning up the city. Lavelle says the city needs to do more to ensure that every person in the city is presented with an equal opportunity regardless of where they live, their age, their race or their gender.